Blazblue - In the Beginning
by Reploid7
Summary: A prequel to Ashes to Ashes. Jacky has had a hard life, but what all does that life entail. See what Jacky was forced to go through in his life before the events of Ashes to Ashes. There will be leaps between events that span lengthy time periods, so try not to be too confused at times. Rated T for blood, violence, and some language.
1. Part 1

"Jacky, breakfast is ready!"

A little boy with a lizard tail climbed out of bed and got a red t-shirt on and slipped into some shorts before strutting over to the kitchen. He ate his bacon and his waffles as he tried to wake up completely. "So, I hear your father will be coming home from traveling. Took some time from all that running around to see his little lizard."

Jacky grunted exhaustedly in return, still not fully awake. That was until he was jarred from his drowsiness when she started tickling him. "No, no, mom, stop it!" he demanded through laughter. The moment was interrupted when someone knocked on the door. "Think that's him?"

"No, it's too early for him to already be here," his mother answered. She left Jacky at the table to go answer the door and found a little girl standing on the other side. "Oh, good morning, Makoto!"

"Hey Mrs. Ray, is Jacky up yet or is he still hibernating?" the little girl asked. Jacky hopped off his chair and made his way to the door.

"Hey Makoto, what's up?" the boy greeted.

"Nothing much, the twins having been crying all morning, so I thought I'd get out. Wanna come and hang with me?"

"Sure, just let me get my shoes," Jacky said retreating back to his room to grab his shoes. Additionally, he grabbed his jacket and ran back to the front door. "Okay, I'm ready. Later, mom!"

"Be careful, sweetie, and don't stay out for too long. The winter temperatures are starting to set in." Mary watched as the two kids ran off out of sight before shutting the front door behind her and heading back into the kitchen.

Makoto and Jacky chased off into the market district, running by the few people that were out early. The two of them dropped into a cafe that opened early and took their seats at a booth. The manager didn't mind, since Jacky's mother and Makoto's father were old friends of her's.

"It must be so much calmer being the only kid in your house, huh?" Makoto said. "I've got siblings, so it's a little wild at my place."

"I don't know. If I get in trouble in the house, I can't shift the blame," he replied. "Course if I get in trouble out here, I can just blame you." He grinned when she punched him in the shoulder.  
"Whatever, I can just deny all charges, bud."

"Anyways, it's not like my mom could have any more kids. My dad's always out of the city, seeing the world."

"I bet it's really cool, being in his shoes."

Two parfaits were set before the children. A chestnut parfait for Makoto and a chocolate banana parfait for Jacky. "Woah! Thanks Melody!"

The manager smiled and said, "No problem. Consider it congrats on your old man coming home. Enjoy, kids."

The two of them dug into their treats without hesitation, stopping only to calm a raging brain freeze. Melody would come by every now and then to sit with them and chat, but when their parfaits were about done, they'd hop out of the booth and go out to roam the streets near their homes. While passing by an alley, Makoto stopped Jacky and pointed towards the empty gap between buildings. "Let's spar!"

"Huh? What brought that up?" Jacky asked. "Why do you wanna fight all of a sudden?"

"You're not wussing out, are you?"

Jacky huffed and ran into the alley, with Makoto following close behind. After getting in the center of the alley, the two raised their fists. Makoto rushed her friend with a burst of speed and threw her fist at him, giving Jacky a small window to react. Without thinking, he turned and raised his tail up like a shield, blocking her punch, but making her scrape her knuckles on the scales of the tail.

"Ow, ow, ow! Now I remember why we don't spar too often. You keep using your tail to block. I think that's cheating."

Jacky laughed and lowered his tail. "You're just jealous that you can't use yours as a shield," he said with a big grin. She punched him in the shoulder before resuming their fight. The sounds of the fight and their grunts and laughing caught the attention of a few people, but the fight didn't last very long. They eventually tired out and made their way home. "I let you win," Jacky insisted as they were about to separate to head home.

"Yeah right. You need to work on your punches. You keep using your tail to attack and defend."

"It's the strongest part of my body."

"Whatever, see you later, lizard boy!"

 _Five hours later_

"Your father should be hear within the next hour." Jacky nodded and rummaged through his things.

"Mom, have you seen my comics?"

"I let Makoto borrow them yesterday. She said she was interested in seeing what you like to read," she answered. Jacky groaned and ran out the house. He made his way to Makoto's house and knocked on the door only for Makoto's father to answer the door.

"Oh, it's you, kid. Come on in. Makoto's just over there." The little squirrel girl was sitting around a couple stacks of Jacky's comics, one of them in hand. She noticed him enter and waved him over.

"Which one are you reading?"

"Attack of the Bots!"

Jacky huffed and sat down behind her, grabbing a comic and reading while the two leaned their backs against each other. As time passed, they flew through the pages of the comics. After another hour or so, Makoto's mother came through into the house with a look of horror on her face, hyperventilating all throughout.

The Beastkin woman couldn't help but stare at the young reptilian boy with a look of sadness and terror. "What's happened?" Makoto's father asked.

"The Ray home is on fire!"

Jacky dropped the comic in his hands and got on his feet, running for the door. This new information and his ever-rising concern were all that ran through his mind as he went to find his home as quickly as possible. When he arrived, the fire was already being extinguished by trained Ars users.

It didn't take long for them to search the ruins of the house.

"Looks like two bodies were inside," one of them said. "One of them isn't quite as damaged as the other. Maybe this guy tried to save the one stuck in the house."

"Do we have any idea how the fire was started?" the other would ask.

"There was traces of seithr everywhere. Probably an amateur Ars user. Most likely a thug or something."

Jacky ran for the ashen remains of his house, ignoring the protests of the people who searched it. It didn't take long to find their bodies. The sight of their burned corpses made his stomach turn and his heart into an aching weight. The boy wasn't sure how long he'd cry for before an Ars user came and took him away from them.

The men that put out the fire would try to ask him questions, but he would never respond to them. What was the point? He would just stand there and stare off at the house's wreckage absent-mindedly. Eventually Makoto's parents came and brought him to their home just as fresh-falling snow would start to drift to the ground. Not even to much of the Nanaya family did he speak. The only one he'd trade words with was Makoto, and even then, it was very little. That night, when the ground was blanketed with snow and more snow continued to drift down from the sky, Jacky overheard a conversation between Makoto and her father.

"Come on, pops, let's just let him stay with us!"

"I'm sorry, Makoto, but we barely have suitable living conditions already. We just can't do this for him. I know he's your friend, but we just aren't able to give him this."

"Please, dad, I mean, just look at-!" She couldn't see Jacky in the house anymore. A chilly air blew in from the wide-open front door, where a trail of shoe prints leading away from the house could be seen.

Jacky was freezing as he ran off. The cold air was making him drowsy and his skin was starting to feel numb and even started to sting. He tried to find a decent place to go, but nowhere seemed safe from the cold other than back at the Nanaya residence. But he heard them loud and clear. They could barely hold up as is and he would just end up making things worse for them.

He didn't want that.

The fatigue eventually got to him and he collapsed in the snow, growing ever colder as time passed. So cold, so painful. He felt like he'd be better off disappearing. Maybe that's how it should be.

 **Author's Note:**

 **Hey guys, sorry that this couldn't have been the next chapter of Dust to Dust, but I've just been so unmotivated and slow in the past months, so I decided to start writing this as a side to help get me remotivated. Not sure if it'll work, but here's hoping.  
Now, I bet this first part seems a bit rushed, but please bare with it.**

 **Reploid7,**

 **Signing off!**


	2. Part 2

The young boy opened his eyes to find himself next to a fire in a cave outside of the city. On the other side of the fire was what appeared to be a cat his size with a cloak and an eyepatch. "Ah, yer finally awake," the cat said. "You almost died out there in the snow storm, kid. You're real lucky, you know that?"

"Who are you?"

"Name's Jubei, kid. Nice to meetcha."

The boy got closer to the fire, hoping to warm up faster. Being out in the cold would have been one thing to a human, but to a cold-blooded reptilian Beastkin like him, it was much worse. "Well, thank you for saving me, Mr. Jubei, sir, but you shouldn't have helped me. I don't have anywhere to go anymore."

"Just as I thought. I knew a kid your age wouldn't be out there unless you were homeless. I take it those ashen ruins were once your home? The burned wood and ash certainly smelled fresh."  
Jacky nodded his head lowering his gaze to the ground at the memory.

"What about friends or family?"

"My mom and dad were the only family I had..."

"What about friends?"

Jacky remained silent, not wanting to discuss the situation Makoto and her family were in. When Jubei finally realized he wasn't going to get an answer, he groaned under his breath. "Well, I think I can give you a place to stay for a while. You gotta promise you won't cause too much trouble, though." All the cat would get in response was a simple nod in agreement. "Then we'll get going in the morning. Hopefully this damn snow storm will end by then."

Jacky laid back down on the cave floor and turned over, away from Jubei. It didn't take long for him to fall asleep. The cold air outside was still ever-present, even with a fire built only two feet away. His nightmares were horrifying. His mother and father being lit up in flames right in front of him, their screams ringing out without end. The only reason it had ever come to an end was because of Jubei shaking him awake when the morning came.

"Hey, kid, the snows stopped. Let's get going."

Jacky followed Jubei through the snow, the gruff feline using heat Ars to keep them warm while they shuffled through the snow on the ground. "Cheer up, kid, it won't take us long to get there." With no answer still from the lizard-tailed young child, Jubei let out a heavy sigh, demanding Jacky's attention. "Come on, kid. Let's give you something to distract you with."

"Like what?" he asked.

"Ars Magus," the cat answered. "Heat and fire Ars, to be specific. You need the use of it more than I do. I'll teach ya while we walk." The heat Ars was simple and easy to use and Jacky managed to learn it within a couple of days, but fire Ars was much more difficult. On the third night, the two checked into an inn for the night. It wasn't exactly the best, but a bed was certainly better than the ground.

"Yer really getting the hang of that Ars Magus, kid." Jacky allowed himself a small smile as he nodded in response, but no words were outright spoken. He's barely ever said a thing for all the time he's been with Jubei. "Don't worry, you'll get the hang of fire Ars soon enough. Just keep practicing, but be careful with it, alright?" Another nod of agreement.

"Good night," Jacky said before climbing into one of the beds in the room they rented.

The next morning, Jacky tried to use fire Ars, but only managed to pull off heat Ars instead. The snow was starting to melt outside as Jubei noticed, while they were finally approaching their destination. A church out in the open was seen off in the distance. "Say hi to your new home, kid." The two made it to the front doors and Jubei opened up the church and entered with Jacky following close behind.

Inside was a young woman and three kids around his age. All of them had blond hair and green eyes and they were all staring at him. Nervous and unsure how to interact with them, he moved over to an empty corner of the room, curled up, and buried his face in his arms.

"Wait, brother, don't go. Just leave him be. If he doesn't talk to us on his own, he may as well just stay there." Jacky could hear one of them talking. It hurt to hear those words, but he did choose to move away from them rather than talk. However, it seemed as though he wouldn't be alone for long.

"Hey, what's up?"

Jacky looked up to find one of them standing in front of him. This one had more spiky hair and seemed a bit older than the other two. Possibly just by a year or two, though. Unsure of how he should respond, he simply nodded in response.

"Come on, guy, talk to me. You can't leave me hanging here," he continued.

What came next just slipped out. "Why are you even bothering with me?" Jacky asked him. "I heard what your brother said and he obviously doesn't want you to talk to me. I won't keep you."

The boy shrugged his shoulders and said, "Eh, Jin can wait. He's always been kinda whiny anyways. Always complaining about one thing or another."

"But I-!" The young boy had more to say, blatantly interrupting what Jacky was going to say.

"You can't just sit in this corner all silent and stuff, man. And quit moaning too. Jeez, if you didn't have that huge tail, I could swear I was talking to Jin!"

Jacky didn't mean to, but his tail smacked the boy in the side. "I don't whine!" he insisted. Immediately after realizing what he did, he spazzed. "I'm sorry! I'm so, so sorry!"

"Hey, hey, it's fine! Don't worry about it. Now come on and get outta that corner and let's do something."

This boy was so persistent, but he was really nice too. Jacky looked down for a moment before asking, "Like what?"

"You could play with us," he suggested. He offered his hand. "Now come on and get off that hard floor."

Jacky reluctantly took the boy's hand and got on his feet before promptly following the blonde over to his siblings. By the look on the younger brother's face, he could tell he didn't approve. The little sister, on the other hand didn't seem disappointed or bummed, she just seemed shy.

"Alright, so, he's Jin, that's our sister, Saya, and I'm Ragna. What's your name?"

Jacky twiddled his fingers and shifted his gaze left and right as he gave them his answer. "Jacky...Ray..."

"Nice to meet you."

X-X-X-X

"It's perfectly fine if he stays here. I really don't mind, Jubei," the sister said before turning her attention to Jacky, now playing with Ragna and the others. "He looks just like-." she started.

"I think he is," Jubei said. "If so, he's just like Ragna over there. Well, I guess time will tell. I betcha my next meal that he is."

 **Author's Note:**

 **And now we start with this. Jacky's now a resident of the church. Oh and guess what? I'm thinking of putting in a gag reel between certain parts of the story. If you have any ideas, go ahead and let me know. You can even request to have an OC in it. Of course, I will credit you at the chapter's end in the Author's Notes, as well as give my thanks.**

 **Anyways, I hope you enjoyed this part and are looking forward to the next one.**

 **Reploid7,**

 **Signing Off!**


End file.
